Tabs To Tasks will help you reduce the number of web browser tabs you have open, save them as a tasks through a bookmarklet, and help you build a workflow to complete those tasks within our website service.

So, unlike most of the other solutions available, our focus is not just on saving the tabs you have open, but also what you do with them after they’re saved.

With yesterday’s developments, we took the first efforts to present the saved tabs back to the user with a reminder email.

An email being just the first method of reminding you in a manageable manner. We’re aware that people have an issue with too many emails sometimes as well, and are open to also sending you reminders through other mediums. We’d love to hear what other methods you’d like to receive a reminder through? And in time we’ll experiment to see what are the most productive times for you to receive reminders.

The initial email will take the approach of showing you 2 from the top and 2 from the bottom of your list. Basically so you’re not just seeing really new tasks, or really old ones.

We’re already breaking up the main list of tasks into new, old, and a medium level, so perhaps 3 separations is going to prove the most effective?

To me it’s really important to close this productivity loop and make sure the tabs saved are put to good use, or archived.

It’s also really important that we get customer feedback, and this goes straight into the development pipeline. This is happening through Trello, and when you’re using Tabs To Tasks you can leave feedback, suggestions or vote on past suggestions going into production at anytime.

So there we have it. We’re closing the loop on productivity and on the customer development lifecycle.

Tabs To Tasks will help you reduce the number of web browser tabs you have open, save them as a tasks through a bookmarklet, and help you build a workflow to complete those tasks within our website service.

I’m passionate about customer driven development and want build new features that will allow Tabs to Tasks users to manage their tabs more productively. As a sponsor, you will have a weekly vote on the next features which will ensure that the product grows to match your needs.

Tell me more…

I’ve limited the weekly payments to 3 months duration at this stage. Development sponsorship would be reaffirmed during month 2 to ensure that everyone is happy with the progress toward the vision. You would ofcourse be able to stop the weekly payments before this.

I’ve picked ChargeBee to manage the subscription aspect of the payment, rather than roll my own on top of Stripe. Though ChargeBee does integrate nicely with Stripe!

It will give a nicer experience in the short-term, and allow for the project sponsors to receive useful information when the payment has been process, and update/cancel the subscription. In the long-term I’ll look for closer payment integration.

What do sponsors get?

Payment will be collected weekly, and I’ve added in a prompt to remind people to vote on development in Trello. It’s all part of the drive to make this as customer driven as possible. Those who subscribe to this method of development will get to make suggestions on the features, and vote on others suggestions. Weekly these votes will be feed into the next development priorities.

The subscription will allow me to develop this project further, and allow you to reduce the number of tabs you have open, and convert them into tasks as we go on.

Thanks to Stef of Makelight for recommending ChargeBee. And John of Golf And Course, for co-working support.

Thanks to those who are sponsoring the project by a beer a week. You can now subscribe and pay for your sponsorship on this ChargeBee checkout page.

It’s been a few weeks, so I thought it’s worth a refresh. Tabs To Tasks will help you reduce the number of web browser tabs you have open, save them as a tasks through a bookmarklet, and help you build a workflow to complete those tasks within our website service.

I posted to the London Startups group about this problem, and found that others in the community also experienced the issue of having too many browser tabs open. I want to develop the solution with users sponsoring the development. However, I didn’t feel far enough along.

So a little more work…

The initial prototype worked for me, and another was also using it. The number of tabs I had open had fallen dramatically. To progress and allow more people to come onboard it need authentication, so this has now been added. I paired with another great software developer mate, to ensure that there was a good test coverage. We’re confident that your list will not be visible to others, and they also won’t be able to edit it. The basics you’d expect. We’re confident that if we add more features, the automatic tests will now show us if this core functionality breaks.

Adding productivity enhancements in partnership with you.

So we can reduce the number of tabs open for users of our product. What’s next? Well, there’s 2 aspects. We want to actually turn these saved tabs, into tasks. And we want to make the whole process of this customer driven.

So, it’s time again to start getting YOU involved again.

We want to have people who have lots of tabs open, who not only want a solution, but are happy to vote once a week on the features they’d like to see. You’ll also get to make new suggestions if you want.

We’ll capture all of the voting in suggestions, and reprioritise once a week. We’ll do that in Trello.

We need a new name…

Whilst the prototype was simply called ‘The Stuff’ – As in save The Stuff, I always knew I’d rebrand. I started this blog with the thinking, we’re not just saving the stuff, but actually doing something with them afterward. I wanted to make sure this solution wasn’t just a bottomless pit to throw tabs into, but to ensure thatthey’re regularly ticked off, archived, or deferred. There’s various mechanisms we can use to do this, but it’s important to me this aspect is incorporated soon.

“How many browser tabs do you have open?”
“Why do you have them open?”
“Do, you use any tools to manage them?”

The answers have surprised me. As well as myself, a lot of other developers & other professions, have a problem with many tabs open.

An idea was born. Lets build a solution together. As an established Ruby On Rails developer with a startup mindset, I’m in a good position to get this started.

Our Customers

Do you have a problem with having too many tabs open? You are one of our customers, and we need your help. Our development process is customer driven.

The Goal

Save your links to read when you have the time. And concentrate on the task in hand. Get prompts to finish what you were doing within a short timeframe.

Why do you have the tab open?

“to look at later”

“save for a newsletter”

“send to a friend”

“for project x”

A tab is a task to be done in the future.

We need to have a mechanism to remind us why the links in the tabs are open & help you do them. Otherwise we’re just going to end up in the same problem, just without 50 tabs open. So, it’s important that the solution enhances productivity.

I’ve made a start with a Chrome Bookmarklet, and a simple Ruby On Rails application hosted on Heroku.

A starting point. How will it get enhanced?

The proposal is to find 10 people who will sponsor this development for just 1 beer a week. In return they’ll get a vote each week on how development goes.

Want to get involved? Contact Ian now and say how many tabs you have open, and he’ll send you a sign up link to pay £4 a week.

Look forward to hearing from you & reducing the number of tabs, and being more productive with the contents.